


Mr. White Has Changed

by almina



Category: Breaking Bad
Genre: Alternate Universe, M/M, Recreational Drug Use
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-05-14
Updated: 2014-05-14
Packaged: 2018-01-24 20:10:16
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,033
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1615541
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/almina/pseuds/almina
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A kindred soul observes Mr. White</p>
            </blockquote>





	Mr. White Has Changed

I saw him in the building supply store parking lot. I couldn’t hear what was said, but the body language told me he was intimidating the shit out of these two grungy guys who glanced over their shoulders at him as they hurried into their grungy van. If Mr. White were a panther, his tail would have been lashing, and his fangs gleaming in the dark.

When I was in his class, at the tender age of thirteen, he didn’t want to be disliked. That was the impression I had. He was decent to me. ‘Excellent again Adrien,' he wrote on my quiz,‘we should find something more challenging for you.’ He didn’t know how right he was. 

I would have graduated at fourteen except for what my mother called ‘unpleasantness’ with the FBI. Twelve counts of computer invasion to be exact. I checked NASA. What did they have on UFOs? The banks? I got into them just to see if it could be done. I did move some funds from account to account to account, again to see if it could be done. The CIA? That was to look around. The vaunted the secrecy is a dare. Does the agency really expect people not to probe? 

The feds wanted to try me as an adult. Me, an adult. Pigs!

I spent thirty months in the juvie. I was mainstreamed back into high school, as a triumph of the juvenile justice system. I suppose I am rehabilitated though teachers are circumspect about correcting me or questioning my absences. They’re afraid that I will invade their computers, brokerage and bank accounts, personnel records and pensions. I won’t. However they would do well to be afraid of my former fellow inmates. In the juvie prison I bought protection. My currency was hacking/cracking know how. Protection included bloodshed. 

I got out with restrictions on computer use. I can use a computer and the web only for school work. Every tiny bit, upstream and downstream, is recorded. I don’t give the parole people anything to bitch about. 

Ask any cyber cop and he will tell you that people like me don’t change. If I’m any example, that’s correct. Fortunately computers are not the only thing to diddle. There’s DNA. Second favorite hack in the world. Yeah, a few thousand people in this country go home from the cube farm and extract DNA from poppies or strawberries and combine it with amoeba DNA, or whatever. For fun. You can buy the most of the equipment on Ebay. 

I started with marijuana, opium poppies, and coca plants. I incinerated my specimens after I extracted their DNA which I combined with carrier algae DNA. It took months, some luck and a lot of persistence to get it right. Algae grows like a motherfucker. The inserted sequences give me the all the cannabinoids and alkaloids I can sell. I raise my recombinant algae – moss - in aquariums with guppies. I have the fish in the tanks as an early warning system. If they die or get sick, I dump the batch. That’s happened only twice. 

Let me tell you about moss.

You inhale. It takes maybe two seconds to make your brain quiver. You step into a happier world, like hearing a song you love. Calm, brightness. You see everything, details of details. Your feet are two inches off the floor. 

Pee in a cup, and there are no incriminating metabolites. First thing I checked. My parole officer, you know. 

I sell moss for $10,000 a dried pound. It’s free to a bent federal prosecutor who keeps me up to date on my case. Both he and my lawyers are certain that moss will be criminalized in a few years. I have to have insulation between myself and the business by then. But by then I will be pig rich and the illegality will only add to the profits. And the fun. The lawyers look forward to it as much as I do.

My family no longer asks me about my money, or about my time in prison.

I am a criminal. I love it so. The danger. The adrenaline that’s on call every second. I am a better-to-reign-in-hell-than-serve-in-heaven sociopath and I don’t want to be anything else.

Which brings me to my affinity for Mr. White. He’s like me now. He’s a criminal. I smell it on him. I don’t know what he’s doing but it’s good for him. Just look at the man, head up and shoulders back. 

I want to cut him in on moss. He’s intelligent. He won’t let his conscience trip him up. I have no patience for people who try to reconcile their illegal behavior with their fragments of conscience. That’s a recipe for getting caught. 

I was in Los Pollos Hermanos yesterday, and there, alone at a table, was Mr. White. I collected my take out and went to him.

“I know you’re up to something,” I said.

He gave me this wolfish sideways look. It wasn’t the depressed, repressed Mr. White of my chemistry class, but a different creature who looked into my eyes. He knows my history. Every teacher in the district does. I couldn’t help smiling at him.

I tapped my knuckles on his table and walked on by. Anyone seeing the exchange would think it’s a student saying hello, or a good looking gay boy making a run at Mr. White. Anything but two predators eying each other.

I sat in my car, hoping he would leave so I could snag him in the parking lot. But no, he shifted tables and was talking to the owner?manager?, a slim black guy, who is a coral snake if I ever saw one. Is he going to be your friend, Mr. White?

Better it’s me. You can't shock me. I can tell you what changes are in store for you. You will be a disaster for your family and all who care for you and for some who don’t. I’ve been there. My family is gravely disappointed in me. Afraid of me too. Time will come that they will deny that they are related to me. 

I need a friend.


End file.
